


Survivor's Guilt

by Accal1a



Category: Cut & Run - Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux, Sidewinder Series - Abigail Roux
Genre: Concussions, M/M, Minor Injuries, Prisoner of War, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 09:34:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17743394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Accal1a/pseuds/Accal1a
Summary: Kelly thinks about the 23 days, 9 hours and 51 minutes that Nick and Ty were gone.





	Survivor's Guilt

**Author's Note:**

> Entirely based on [this post](http://theinterrogationroom.tumblr.com/post/49412801387/ts-why-were-you-guys-seperated-when-ty-nick-got). I read it and knew I just _had_ to write it.

Kelly awoke to the sound of chaos.

He heard the pop of heated metal, the ping of bullets as they rained down on said metal and the rapid-fire sound of their own guns firing back. He looked up when he felt rough hands grab the back of his jacket and start to drag him away.

Kelly struggled in the grip, finally seeing the scene for what it was. Their helo had gone down, Ty was at least unconscious, if not dead and Nick was staring at him with wide eyes. He couldn't seem to get his limbs to co-ordinate with each other, he could feel his vision fading fast and he knew that he needed to stay awake, needed to help his brothers. He could see Owen's boots off to the right, and Digger's back, but he didn't know what their status was, beyond utterly screwed if he couldn't get free. He couldn't see Sanchez at all.

Nick saw Kelly struggling with his assailant and he didn't think, even as he saw someone move in his peripheral vision, he pulled his knife and threw it at the man holding his friend. He saw the man who had been holding Kelly drop off to the side and Kelly slump to the ground without the support. Kelly didn't move, obviously passed out and Nick felt sick. If they had moved Kelly and the man died, he wasn't leaving any of the fuckers left alive to cry about it, he would burn them all down one by one.

The last thing he remembered before he was dragged away – with Ty – and resoundedly knocked out by a man speaking in rapid-fire Dari, was seeing Kelly's chest rise and fall.

His brother wasn't dead. Nick had done that right at least.

~~~

"Where are they?" Kelly said, voice rising in panic and going from prone to sitting up in less than a second. The Corpsman working on him didn't have a chance when Kelly grabbed him by his shirt and pulled him forward. "WHERE THE FUCK ARE THEY?"

"The status of…"

"Fuck your 'status'es." Kelly spat.

"Doc…" A voice said, slurring even that one syllable.

Kelly turned his head quickly, then let his hand fall from the iron grip he'd had on the Corpsman's shirt when he groaned and put his head in his hands. "Fuck." He said emphatically, noticing the way the staff were giving him a wide berth. 

"Doc?" Digger repeated.

"The others?" Kelly said quietly, all fire lost. He knew even before he had finished the question. If Nick or Ty weren't by his bedside they were dead or worse.

"Owen's not woken up yet." Digger said slowly, pointing to the bed on the other side of Kelly.

Kelly glanced over at his other friend, mentally checking him over with his trained eyes. When he didn't hear Digger continue, Kelly turned back to him.

"And…" He prompted.

Digger looked away for a second before looking back. Kelly deserved to have this news from him staring him straight in the eye.

"They've got them."

~~~

**1.**

Kelly stayed in the medical area for far longer than he wanted to. He kept trying to get up, kept trying to ask questions, kept trying to do something, _anything_ to be useful, to help his friends...his brothers. He couldn't do that with an IV in his arm, a perky Corpsman pushing him down every time he moved and two of his other brothers out of commission. He thought he might have been sedated at one point, because he woke up and he knew that hours had passed.

“Motherfuckers!” He said, before he'd even opened his eyes, pulling at the IV on his arm.

“Doc.” Sanchez's soft voice said next to him, gently pulling his hand away from the needle.

“Fuck.” Kelly said emphatically.

“Yeah.” His brother replied.

There was nothing more to say.

**2.**

Kelly refused to think of it as a Vigil.

Owen hadn't woken up and there was no reason to suspect he wouldn't, other than the fact he was still unconscious and it had been two days. He knew, medically, that there was nothing that they could do but wait, but that didn't make it any easier.

He had actually fallen asleep, head pillowed on one arm when he felt Owen stir. He was standing up and checking his vitals before he'd even consciously realised he was doing it. 

“You're okay, Ozone. You're okay. You're okay.” He repeated over and over again, to reassure himself as much as his brother.

“Doc?” Owen asked blearily, still fighting off the sedating effects of a head injury. “You look like shit.”

Kelly laughed, and it came out a harsh, wet sound.

Owen knew that laugh, that laugh that said that was so far from an understatement it was untrue. He struggled to sit up, but Kelly pushed him back down.

“Who's dead?” Owen asked quietly.

“Nick...Ty...they're...” Kelly started, then quickly amended what he was saying when he saw the shock in Owen's eyes. “No, sorry. They're not dead. They're...fuck.”

“Doc. Breathe. It's okay.”

Kelly turned wild eyes on him then, because it was not fucking okay at all. They were gone and at the very least Nick's capture had been his fault.

“I can't...” Kelly said, wrenching his hand away from Owen's and walking out of the tent quickly.

Seconds later, Sanchez ran in, assuming the worst from the way Kelly had walked out, barely keeping it together.

“Easy, what's going on?”

~~~

**3.**

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO FIND THEM?!" Kelly asked before his Commanding Officer said anything.

"Check yourself, Corpsman."

"Write me up for insubordination. I don’t fucking care." Kelly said, gesticulating wildly.

"I know that this is a diffic…" His superior said, trying to save the man from saying anything further he couldn't take back. He'd been through this, been through _both_ sides of this. He knew what the man was feeling.

"Fuck this." Kelly said, storming out of the tent.

~~~

**7.**

Kelly had failed to get his gear on three times in the last five minutes. To begin with he had just been staring at it, unmoving, willing himself to do it, willing himself to go back out into the field. Then he had picked it up in his hands and remembered the last time he was wearing some of it, memories of twisted metal and blood and foreign languages assaulted him so fast that he took a step back. When he took a deep breath and finally started to strap it to himself, he forgot the order that it should be done and had to backtrack.

Owen watched from across the room, finally ignoring his own gear to walk over to Kelly and start to take his off, placing it down carefully and methodically, in precisely the place Kelly had picked it up from. It warmed Kelly's heart to know Owen knew him that well, but he was still confused.

“What are you doing?”

“You're not going out there today.”

“What?” Kelly replied, then started to swat at Owen's hands which were still unclipping parts of his gear, trying valiantly to keep it on his person.

“You're not going out there. I'm pulling medic rank.” His friend said, completely seriously.

“You're not a medic!” Kelly said in exasperation.

“You're not going out there.” Owen repeated, able to divest Kelly off his gear far quicker than Kelly was able to stop him. “You're on wellness leave.”

“I...”

“Get.” Owen said fondly, pulling Kelly into a quick hug before letting him go.

Their superior looked across the area, seeing Kelly trudge back to their racks. He looked at Owen and Owen stared back, ready to fight about his decision if needed. Nothing came of it though, the man just nodded and turned away. He could see the validity of Owen's decision. 

Kelly Abbott was not fit for purpose right now.

~~~

**10.**

Kelly didn't know how long he had been sitting there. It was long enough that some of his muscles had seized up, and he knew that when he did move he'd be in pain, but he couldn't make himself stretch.

It was mad, but he thought maybe, _maybe_ if he just stayed as still as possible, stared at the entrance to the camp, and willed them to return, somehow the universe would return them to him, somehow the universe would take pity and fill the pit in his chest that seemed to be growing worse each day.

Of course the universe wasn't that kind.

~~~

**11.**

It wasn't until over a week after that fateful crash that the salvage was able to be completed. Standard protocol was to never leave tech or equipment behind that could be used against them at a later date, but the place where the helo had gone down saw heavy enemy traffic and it had taken several units to retrieve everything, gunning down as many of the fuckers as they could at the same time.

Kelly stared at the detritus. Anything that could be brought back had been, then the helo had been detonated, lest it fall into enemy hands. It felt like more of a failure than the mission already had been, staring at the bits and pieces of their gear.

A glint of metal caught his eye and he noticed Nick's dagger amongst the pile. He scrambled to get at it, pushing someone out of the way to make sure it was in his hands as quickly as possible. This knife had saved his life, this knife had saved him from being dragged away to who knew what fate. Nick had saved him, instead of potentially saving himself. Whatever hell befell Nick now, it was partially his fault. He may as well have dragged Nick away himself.

He strapped the knife to his thigh, entirely breaking protocol, stopping it from being catalogued along with anything else. Someone tried to stop him and he gave them a look so dire that they shrunk backwards.

No-one stopped him after that.

Digger flashed him a wan smile as Kelly left the tent. He'd had enough for the day.

~~~

**13.**

"Doc." Sanchez said quietly, making sure he approached Kelly from the side so he didn't startle him.

Kelly didn't look at him, or change his stance, just threw the knife with precision to a post several yards away. When it stuck in the wood, Kelly moved to retrieve it and then came back to that same spot, looking at the target again. He threw it and hit his target in almost the exact same place.

"Doc."

Kelly ignored him, throwing the knife over and over and over again. He thought of how Nick had thrown the knife with such precision that it had hit the person pulling him away. That he had had such precision that he hadn't harmed Kelly one bit. 

Somehow throwing it himself made him feel closer to his brother, as if the mere action could convey some bond over the distance, allowing Nick to feel that at some point soon the equivalent of a knife would be thrown to save him as well.

Kelly prayed that wasn't just wishful thinking.

After a while, Sanchez stopped trying to speak with him and just stood there, silently holding vigil with his friend, giving him whatever comfort he could with his presence. Kelly shouldn't be alone right now, none of them should.

~~~

**14.**

The Corpsman had no idea what the code was for 'someone's trashing the med tent', it was almost 'man down' but not quite. This man was seriously compromised though, so it was close. The man had apparently gone into a frenzied rage when he'd been unable to thread the needle to stitch up a marine's side. He'd attempted it several times and the failure had flipped a switch. He'd swept items onto the floor, collapsed shelves and flipped over two beds. It was carnage in the room now and he had no idea how to deal with it.

It took two heavyset marines, who had heard the ruckus and come in, to pull Kelly out of the tent and throw him to the floor, all but sitting on him to stop him getting up.

Kelly's breathing eventually slowed and he nodded. "I'm okay."

The men didn't look convinced, but Owen's clear voice appearing as if by magic did it. "He's okay."

When they allowed him to move, Kelly sat on the ground, his forearms resting on his knees, his head bowed.

"I'm losing it, Ozone. I'm fucking _losing_ it."

"We're okay." Owen said, sitting down next to him, right there in the middle of the camp.

Kelly looked up at him with eyes full of heartbreak. "We're not _all_ okay." He whispered.

There was nothing Owen could say to that…because Kelly was right. They weren't whole; they may never be whole again.

~~~

**17.**

Kelly heard the order, but it didn't compute. He'd recognised that someone was speaking, but he'd reached the end of his tolerance for any sort of socialising…which was sort of hard in an organisation like the military.

Eventually, the shouting registered, but then he Found he had absolutely no desire to follow through with the demand, consequences be damned. 

"No." He finally managed, listening to the harsh sound of his voice, scratchy from underuse.

"No?" His CO repeated, incredulity tingeing his voice.

"No…Sir?" Kelly said, realising he'd forgotten the man's rank when he'd replied.

The other man stared at him for long moments, trying to work out whether he was being a smart ass. After a further moment, he merely turned and walked away.

Kelly's shoulders slumped in relief. He had no idea what he'd been told to do, but he was relieved he hadn't been pushed to it.

He'd only have failed at that too. 

~~~

**21.**

Kelly realised, three weeks into the hell that was now their lives that he couldn't think properly without Nick. Nick always knew what to say to him, whatever mood he was in. Everything was okay with Nick's arm slung around his shoulder, and the non-weight of the appendage across his back meant he felt consistently off balance.

The guilt was crushing him.

The knowledge that when Nick and Ty were taken he had been the only one awake was overwhelming.

He had been their one and only chance at not being taken, and he had failed them. Their deaths were on him. He was too weak to save two of his brothers. He should have pushed harder for consciousness so he could help them. Nick had been fighting for his own life and in that moment he hadn't thought, hadn't blinked, just threw a knife to save him and he couldn't give him the same courtesy.

He had failed, and that fact was almost too much to bear.

~~~

**22.**

For some reason the day after the three week mark was the worst.

Up until then, there was still a tiny voice in the back of Kelly's head that said they would get them back, that it wasn't futile to hope. Now though, now they knew this wasn't going to be a rescue, this was going to be a recovery. It was going to be picking up the pieces of his friends, seeing their mutilated forms and knowing he could have stopped it, if only he'd been stronger.

Not even the camaraderie of his other team mates was enough to quell the rising dread, because they felt it too. They met in silence and stayed that way.

After all, what more was there to say?

~~~

**23.**

When Kelly heard the shouts, the calls of 'Grady' and 'O'Flaherty' echoing around the camp, he shouldered everyone out of the way, leaping into the deuce and a half before it had even fully stopped.

He paused for a second when he had. There were so many injuries that he didn't know where to start touching, where would hurt the least. In the end he settled for a brief squeeze of Nick's ankle causing Nick to shift and give out a soft gasp of pain. The pat that he gave to Ty's ankle was met with a similar noise and Kelly felt the rage rise in him. They didn't deserve this.

Kelly knew he was crying, but he couldn't stop. He would work through the haze though, he could do fucking _anything_ anyone asked of him right now because Nick and Ty were back, banged up but alive. Blessedly alive. 

He felt his own heart lurch into a steady rhythm again, as if having his team whole had given him a shot of adrenaline.

Now, he could start to atone for his sin.

~~~

~~~

~~~

~~~

~~~

"Why did you never tell me that before?" Nick asked softly, stroking his hand through Kelly's hair.

Kelly had woken up screaming for the fourth night in a row, screaming Nick's name, scrabbling for the knowledge that his partner was alive, he was safe, he was next to him. Nick had softly asked Kelly to tell him what was happening and Kelly had kept his mouth closed for long moments, before angrily swiping at his eyes and starting to speak. He told Nick all the things he thought about in the dead of night, all the guilt and pain he felt that he had never voiced before. He let it out and let himself be held.

Kelly shrugged, as much as he could, lying as he was against Nick's chest. "I never told you…I never told you because it didn't matter. We had you back." He said, though his breath hitched on the words, thinking of how close they'd come to losing them both. "But that's twice now…" He trailed off.

"What?" Nick said softly.

"That's twice I've nearly lost you. I don't…I can't…"

Nick moved so that he could pull Kelly further up the bed, so that he was able to look into his eyes. "I'm here. We're both here. We're safe now."

Kelly chuckled ruefully, fully aware that new tears were tracking down his cheeks. "Why can't my brain remember that in the dark?"

Nick kissed Kelly's temple. "I'll always be here to remind you."

**Author's Note:**

> Come and visit the [Cut & Run Discord Server](https://discord.gg/vvy6c76) and join us as we discuss/scream about this awesome series.


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